I have been in the hospital with my mom everyday for about 20 days in total and I have seen a lot of things here. Most of the things I have seen are not pleasant. One of the things I see regularly in the hospital are signs telling you to wash your hands and Purell bottles everywhere. There are signs in every bathroom and in hallways picturing a Petri dish filled with a reddish gel type substance (probably sugar based) and in the gel is a bacterial hand. The bacteria is green, brown, white and fuzzy. ew. The sign says "It's in your hands.....Washing your hands for 15 seconds with soup helps prevent the spread of bacteria". The Purell bottles are in every room, outside every room, in the hallways.

Why am I tell you this you may ask. Well I am telling you this because I am becoming phobic. Germ phobic. I think about germs all day long. When touching anything I think of bacteria. I see signs on some rooms that say STOP!! CONTACT ISOLATION. Apparently the person in that room has a bacterial infection that spreads by contact. Most likely C-DIFF (Clostridium difficile) which causes pain, cramping, fever, and long and frequent visits to the bathroom. In some patients, if it is not caught soon enough, it can cause death. And this bacteria spreads by contact...contact with stethoscopes, bed rails, elevator buttons, door handles, anything, everything.

Of course they have done test on some of the most common things you touch in your everyday life and these are the top six things that contain the most colony forming units (CFU) of bacteria:

> 1. Shopping cart handles - 1100 CFU per 10 sq cm
> 2. Internet café computer mouse - 690
> 3. Bus hand straps - 380
> 4. Public toilet handles and door knobs - 340.
> 5. Lift buttons at 130
> 6. Train hand straps - 86

What do people do before touching shopping cart handles? They have three times more bacteria than door knobs and toilet handles. ew

Just so you know I am not normally germ conscious. I wash my hands, I don't like to touch things that are visibly dirty, and I avoid excessively dirty places but I really don't give much thought to shopping cart handles and elevator buttons. I do now. As if I didn't already have enough things to worry about now I have this too.

Where I got the above list:


http://www.theage.com.au/news/breaking/ewww-dont-touch-that-mouse/2006/02/15/113...
 

Some people get what they deserve

http://failblog.org/2008/08/13/honking-fail/
 

I want to feel like this again

Fun with Balloons and Tequila

Another day in the hospital. I have to say that I am getting tired of being here. My mom seems to be getting better. That's good. She is a lot stronger.

I have been spending my time browsing WDC. It is interesting enough to do all day. It's better than watching animal planet which is my mom's favorite channel. If it is not animal planet it is Judge Judy, Oprah, and Dr Phil. Can you hear the primal scream where you are?

I have actually written some poetry in my weeks here. Only two, one for a contest and one just because. I don't write poetry so I have no idea where that is coming from. It's probably pretty bad but I am so tired I don't care. I'll rewrite later.

My husband, lets call him Mr. Ellee, is really missing me. Mr. Ellee hates to talk on the phone. If he is on longer than two minutes I know something is up. In his defense I am like that too. I am succinct, as you can see by the length of most of my blog entries. I like to get to the point and not rattle on. I am like that on the phone too. So is he. But lately, he has been calling me three times a day. Talking for twenty minutes or more each time. We never even did that while we were dating.

I miss him too.

 

My mom says she is feeling better but she is still very weak. They are pumping her full of broad spectrum antibiotics and giving her fungal medication. The tests haven't come back so they don't know exactly what they are doing. They know something is out there and they are just firing away hoping they hit it. In essence they are shooting a Gatling gun instead of using a sniper rifle. Personally when playing Halo I prefer the sniper rifle. But then again when fighting the flood, a shot gun. Of course if I am up close and personal I choose the energy sword or my fist. I guess that is the point. You have to know your situation and your enemy then you can choose the proper weapon.

Thanks everyone for your kind comments.

Hopefully soon I can be a little perkier. I'm anti-perky right now. Oh who am I fooling. I have never been perky in my entire life. How does one be perky anyway?
 

So I am a bit depressed right now. It's amazing how depression can make you feel so tired and worn out cuz that's how I feel. Maybe I am coming down with something. Who knows.

I am sitting in the hospital again with my mom. They admitted her back into the hospital today after only 4 days out of the hospital. She has pneumonia or they suspect that she has pneumonia. They are doing the cultures right now. They are testing her lungs and her blood. She started taking a turn for the worse a couple days ago. We had an appointment already to get her chest tube taken out today and that part worked out. No more chest tube. But when they looked at the x-ray of her lungs it showed that there was possibly something growing in there. So right away they admitted her into the hospital. I am glad they are not taking any chances. Pneumonia is a nasty thing.

I am sure all of you know that Bernie Mac died just recently of pneumonia and he was only 50 years old! Of course he had an underlying condition just like my mom. According to this article in the Chicago Tribune: http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/chi-bernie-mac-dead,0,995933.story

"Mac died early Saturday morning of complications due to pneumonia, his publicist said. Mac, 50, had been hospitalized for about a week at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, according to his spokeswoman. A few years ago, Mac disclosed that he suffered from sarcoidosis, a rare autoimmune disease that causes inflammation in tissue, most often in the lungs."

That worries me. My mom is 70, she just got through major surgery, and she has a major lung disease that is well advanced.

Did I mention that I am a bit depressed?


 

Have you ever had one of those days where you get a song stuck in your head? You know the kind where no matter what you do you can not get the song to stop playing over and over in your head?

I remember when Sting/Police came out with King Of Pain. And the song was a king of pain. Pain in my head because I couldn't stop repeating the same three lines over and over...the only ones remembered from the song....

There's a little black spot on the sun today
((That's my soul up there))
It's the same old thing as yesterday

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqBO_65Ih4g


But that song is not the song I have stuck in my head today. Today I have been repeating this song over and over:

They say a man should always dress for the job he wants
so why am I dressed up like a pirate in this restaurant.
It’s all because some hacker stole my identity.
Now I’m in here every evening serving chowder and iced tea.
Should have gone to free....credit...report dot com (yeehaa!)
I could have seen this coming at me like an atom bomb.
They monitor your credit and send you email alerts.
So you don’t end up selling fish to tourists in t-shirts.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWnUmpQhiOw


And just to mix things up my brain gave me this song as an alternative.....

well I married my dream girl,
I married my dream girl
but she didn’t tell me her credit was bad
So now instead of living in a pleasant suburb
we’re living in the basement at her mom and dad’s
No we can’t get a loan
for a respectable home
just because my girl defaulted
on some old credit card
if we’d gone to free credit report dot com
I’d be a happy bachelor with a dog and a yard

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FspHU8hOxhY


Does anyone have a gun?




 

I was reminded today by my mom about a time in my life when I had imaginary friends. My imaginary friends were Herbie and Boyfriend. Boyfriend was just that, my boyfriend. I guess I didn't feel the need to name Boyfriend or I decided instinctively to follow the tradition of all or our ancestors and gave him a name based on occupation. You know, like Carpenter, Brewer, Knight, or Mason.

According to my mom I went nowhere without Boyfriend and Herbie. My mom would have to set extra places at the dinner table for Boyfriend and Herbie because they needed to eat dinner too. Everyone was required to include Boyfriend and Herbie in all plans. That included my mom's boyfriend, Joe.

Joe made the mistake of not letting Herbie in the car once. Of course he just started dating Mom so he was blissfully unaware of Boyfriend and Herbie. He opened the car door for me to crawl into the back seat. Once I situated myself, he promptly shut the door and that elicited some very loud crying from me. Opening the car door in a panic, probably thinking I was hurt he asks, "What's the matter".

"You shut the door on Herbie," I cry.

"Who's Herbie?"

I only sob louder so My mom explains to him about Herbie and Boyfriend and that he should hold the door open for Herbie. Joe did as instructed and Herbie was able to climb in beside me.

"Where's Boyfriend," he asks before shutting the door.

"He's right here," I say and indicate the seat next to me. Apparently I let Boyfriend climb in before me.

I was happy and Joe continued to include Herbie and Boyfriend in all future events.

Just so you know, my vivid imagination didn't deter Joe because he married my mom anyway.

Oh and by the way, Herbie was a donkey.



 

Today has been pretty uneventful. My mom received a visit from a nurse to make sure she is doing okay at home. The nurse changed my mom's bandages which I am very thankful for. I had to do it yesterday. It is weird seeing a two inch slice in my mom's chest with a tube sutured into it with black thread .I don't like seeing the red flesh like raw steak curling out around the tube but the bandages need to be changed everyday to prevent infection. I could never be a doctor or a nurse simply because I can't take the visuals.

I didn't do much today but I did play tanks on Wii with my uncle. He is 68 years old and tanks is his favorite game. (I personally prefer Halo or Oblivion myself so tanks is a bit on the slow side for me) I love my uncle. He reminds me of my grandmother. He was always my favorite uncle when I was a kid. He is mellow. He is so mellow and laid back that he takes no time to enunciate his words. He mumbles. You can not understand what that man says 75% of the time. You can ask him to repeat himself but the repeat is just as mumbled as the original. I just nod my head and hope that the 25% I do understand will clue me in to what the conversation is about. Usually it works because he only talks about a few things; cars (collectors cars that are fast are the most talked about), politics (Obama scares him because he is a socialist and he is going to ruin this country), energy saving techniques (windmills in Illinois are a waste of time), and the economy (it's not looking good for my generation because we are heading into another depression. You can mark his words on that).

I think that Mr. Waltz is correct in his comment to my blog "She's Home" . Today has been free from any drama and relaxed and I still don't have the mind to apply myself to writing.....although.....I have read some interesting blogs today:

Nada's Continuing Blog Part II: ""I Second That Emotion" -Part 18" 

bronxbishop blog: "Invalid Entry" 

The Literary Penguin: "Invalid Entry" 



 

They let her out of the hospital today. I am so relieved. Next visit to the hospital happens Tuesday. They will clamp her chest tube again to see if it collapses her lung. If not they will remove it. If that happens I am going home next Friday!!!

Anyway I am happy she is home. She is too. Maybe now I can actually get some writing done.
 

So the doctors clamped her chest tube to see if there would be a build up of air in her chest cavity. There was. It collapsed half of her lung. They removed the clamps and then gave her a smaller chest tube thingy so it will be easier for her to get around. They said that she could go home tomorrow. Wooo hooo!

She has an appointment for next Tuesday to check her leaking lung again. Hopefully they can remove it then. I wont go home until she is completely better and I am so ready to go home. I miss my husband. I miss my cat. I miss my bed. I don't like the humidly and the heat here in Illinois. I miss my Reno weather!

I know I am whining.

I am glad that my mom is doing and feeling well enough to go home though. I have had my fill of hospitals and hospital foods for quite some time.



 

So things are much better now. She is gaining her normal strength back. They are thinking about removing her chest tubes tomorrow. If that is successful (removing them too soon can cause her lung to collapse), then she should be able to be discharged. Maybe after that I can get some sleep. I feel like I have been up for 50 years. It was my hope that I would actually have some time to write while I was here but my mind is mush and I have no desire for anything really....well, other than sleeping for two weeks. I was supposed to go back to work this past Monday but my mind just wont engage. I am be inundated with emails from work but I don't have the mental energy to tackle all the questions. I am a product manager at work (basically I write requirements for software development). Right now we are building a new software engine that processes direct deposit transactions for payroll. We are in QA right now and I wrote the requirements.....so I have a ton of questions waiting for me and I don't really care. It just doesn't seem so important given what my mom has recently gone through.
 

So to round out the entry "My mom day 4" . My mom got to the point where she didn't remember me or should I say she thought that every nurse who walked in the door was me and I was the nurse. At times she thought it was about twenty years ago when I was 22. She was telling me that she didn't like me changing jobs so often. The saddest part was when she started crying because she thought she was a bad mother to me.

In the end, though, the neurologist diagnosed her with Thiamine (vitamin B-1) Deficiency which was causing Korsakoff's syndrome which eventually results in coma. Thiamine deficiency can be caused by alcoholism or malnutrition. In my mom's case, alcoholism. On top of the Thiamine Deficiency, she was also experiencing alcohol withdrawal.

They gave her a vitamin B-1 shot and an alcohol drip (5%) and now two days later she is all better (at least her mind is right now). She still has to recover from the surgery which is going good. She has her appetite back. Her color is good. She is sleeping better. I am so glad everything is better for now.


I need an alcohol drip.





Korsakoff's syndrome: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korsakoff's_syndrome
Alcohol Withdrawal: http://alcoholism.about.com/cs/withdraw/a/aa030307a.htm
 

So four days ago my mom had the LVRS surgery I mentioned below. Yesterday she started having seizures the neurologist came and gave her an exam and she did everything fine. Today they did a CT scan which is a type of neuroimaging on her. It came back a little abnormal which is freaking me out.

She is not acting herself and is seeing things and just generally not making any sense today. Yesterday, even though she was having seizures, she was still very cognizant of her surroundings. She was quick witted, irritable, and just generally herself even though she was in a fair amount of pain. Today I can get her to do what ever I want. I tell her to do something, she does it. This is not normal although it certainly is easier on me. She talks about things quite randomly. Free Radicals were big on her list a couple of hours ago. She asked me if I saw them. I said no. I asked her what they were doing. She said "They're Free. They are just running around free." Then she said that the couch was very expensive.

"What couch, mom?"

"The one next to the chair," she said. Seems reasonable enough except there is only a bed and three chairs in the room. She is laying back in the only reclining chair in the room. All the others are straight-back chairs. "Is that the couch, Mom?" I point to the bed. She wouldn't answer.

Later she said to no one, "I have to figure out a way to get out of this mess".

"What mess, Mom?"

"This mess," she says.

"Are you talking about being in the hospital?"

She looks at me. "Who's in the hospital?"

"You are."

"I am not", she says indignantly.

"Where are you then?"

"Right here." She looks at me like I am a smart ass.

Sigh. What will I do if my mom doesn't come back?
 

I have had a hard time recently trying to come up with things to write on this blog lately. I would really like to post something everyday but my mind has been preoccupied with my mom. My mom has emphysema which is a disease that causes progressive damage to the small air sacs and small airways in your lungs. This damage obstructs airflow when you exhale. The result of it is you have lungs that are full of old air all the time. If you take a big lung full of air and don't exhale that and then try to take more air in and don't exhale that and then try to take more air in....that's how it feels....it feels like you are trying to fill something up that is already full. My mom has about 18% to 20% lung capacity which means when she inhales and exhales only 18% to 20% of her lung is utilized. Part of the reason for that is the dead lung which is full of old air keeps the good part of her lung inflated.

One of the ways doctors have come up with to help alleviate that is to do a procedure called lung volume reduction surgery (LVRS) which is where they cut out the dead inflated parts of the lung and staple everything back together. This stapling causes the lung to leak so they have to put tubes in each side of the rib cage to allow the leaking air to expel otherwise the leaking air would cause the lung to collapse. This surgery empties part of the diaphragm which allows space for the good lung to expand and contract normally and the result is increased lung capacity. This surgery just recently became eligible for Medicare coverage.

My mom had the lung LVRS surgery yesterday morning. She had thirty percent of her lungs removed. She only has minor air leakage which is good. The doctors are hopeful and profess that she is doing fine. She is over 70 so there is some concern about that as well as the risk for pneumonia in her already damaged lungs. She has a morphine pump so she sleeps a lot. That is what she is doing now. ICU is not a fun place to be when you are not feeling well. It is noisy and chaotic so any sleep she can get is welcomed.

Today she will have to get up and walk around and her success with that will determine if she will leave ICU and get a room on the floor. That should help her a bit because there is someone coming in and out of this room every 10 to 20 minutes. Poor woman can't recover like that. I understand why they do it. They have to monitor her. Give her breathing treatments so her lungs wont collapse. All of it is for her own good.

Anyway I have vented a little. There might be more to come. Depends on the stress level.

 

You have to celebrate small victories in small ways....

Girl: Well, I didn't shave my armpits this morning.
Guy: Oh.
Girl: Yeah, that was my idea of celebrating!
http://www.overheardinnewyork.com/archives/015529.html

I personally celebrate small victories by not shaving my legs. Small victories include waking up in the morning.
 

So my comment blunder on Robert Waltz blog entry "The Long Dark Knight of the Movie"  reminds me of how silly I can be sometimes. I have the tendency to mix things up like that often and it never fails to make me laugh at myself. I am a self-entertaining creature. I wonder if that is the nature of a writer, to be self entertaining? Anyway, I though I would post some of the blunders I have made in the past with metaphors. I never fail to mix them.

These make me laugh especially because of the look on the other person's face when they realize my error. It's priceless. It's a joy that I wouldn't want to forego. I am also a lot of fun in meeting because of this.

Here goes:

- Right between the nose
- It's not rocket surgery
- We've only scratched the tip of the iceberg
- Like cutting butter on a hot tin roof
- Don't make a mole hill out of a mountain
- Don't eat with your mouth full
- Don't burn your bridges until you come to them
- Nothing out of the unusual
- It's on the tip of my brain
- I flew off the deep end
- It's not set in stone
- Without fear of hesitation
- Is a mute point

So needless to say there will be other blunders so please don't hesitate to bring them to my attention. I wouldn't want to miss out on a good laugh.





 

O sometimes I wish I were home. Home for me is Virginia. The yearning for my birthplace is usually sparked by something that I can no longer have. Today's item that I have been isolated from for far too long is the Chesapeake Bay Blue Crab. For the most part, here on the west coast, no one here knows what blue crab is and if by off chance you find it in a restaurant it is usually in the form of a crab cake that has too much bread in it. BLAH.

I miss going across the Potomac to Maryland and eating at places like Robertson's Crab House which sits right on the Potomac river and has all you can eat blue crab. My parents and I would go there on the weekends occasionally and spend hours eating blue crab and drinking beer. Well they would drink the beer because I was under age. Fact is on a couple of occasions I had to drive them home because they had so much to drink....once when I was 14! Now that was fun. I didn't get stopped by the police and I made it home safely. I don't know what is worse...them driving drunk or having a 14 year old girl drive them home while they were drunk. I digress.

So this blog is dedicated to my love and loss of blue crab cooked in Old Bay and beer. Yum. The west coast doesn't have everything! Next blog on Virginia yearnings will be dedicated to scrapple. The breakfast food of the gods.

 

Do you have a love-hate relationship with what you write? I know I do. When I first start out with a new idea I am totally enthralled with it. Then later, not so much. I am never satisfied with anything that I write. I edit and edit and edit and edit. I have never met a story that I have written where I was completely satisfied with it. I have come to terms with it by not ever reading it again.

I never though about how much my writing is like a relationship until I read this completely funny take on writing a novel.....

Writing a novel, a love story

"THE BEGINNING
Look at all my pretty ideas. Aren't they pretty? That one's a good dancer but that one has gorgeous eyes and a car. And that one, the intellect of Spock and he gets all my jokes. I like that one. So intriguing. Yes, I'll pick that one.

THE EARLY STAGES
OMG, y'all. My book and I went out again yesterday, and you know what? My book is so, so clever! Seriously. It was only our third date and it brought me fresh metaphor. I know, right? I wasn't expecting that at all. Plus, my book is so easy to talk to--it never feels like work. We just relate sooo well. I think this could be something special. I'm seeing my book again tomorrow. I can't wait.

THE FIRST DRAFT
I love this book. And it loves me. I never want to be without this book. Never, ever. What? Were you saying something? I'm sorry I can't hear you because my book just said the best thing ever. Wait--just listen to this sentence. I know! Isn't my book so dreamy? I love you, book. Do you love me? Of course you do. OMG--we said that at the SAME TIME! WE ARE SO IN TUNE! This is going to be the best book ever written. Oh, whisper that again. I Pulitzer you too, honey. Sigh.

THE REVISION, MONTH ONE
Honey...do you still love me?"

.... Click on the link to see the rest....LOL
http://libba-bray.livejournal.com/36896.html



What is your relationship with writing like?

 

This is for you Robert Waltz

I Tried Them Once, But I Kept Getting Stuck to the Fridge

Not-so-chubby girl: Dude, I'm so fat.

Ordinary girl: No you're not. You just got a little belly.

Not-so-chubby girl: Yeah...I wish I had fat magnets so I could put them in my bra. It would suck up all my fat and make me go up a cup size.

Ordinary girl: Wow. And I always thought plastic surgery was the only option.

--NYU



http://www.overheardinnewyork.com/archives/015416.html